Final answer:
A decentralized claims department distributes claims processing responsibilities across multiple offices. Historical examples include the Indian Claims Commission and the Court of Appeals for civil actions against the State of Michigan, which handled specific types of lawsuits in a more efficient, organized manner.
Step-by-step explanation:
An outline of a decentralized claims department might involve discussing a system where claims processing and decision-making responsibilities are distributed among several different offices or locations, rather than being centralized in one main office. This approach can be seen historically, for instance, in the 1940s with the establishment of the Indian Claims Commission in response to a large volume of lawsuits. In this case, claims about the whole, the numerous lawsuits against the federal government, were handled by analyzing claims about the parts, individual tribal lawsuits and their specific grievances.
The decentralized approach was also used to consolidate many cases to improve efficiency, as with the Klamath tribe's lawsuits, eventually leading to one combined case. By the time the Indian Claims Commission ended in 1978, it had processed a significant number of cases, awarding substantial sums. Similarly, a decentralized claims department within a particular jurisdiction, such as the Court of Appeals, manages civil actions against the State of Michigan separately but in an organized manner, dealing with specific types of claims including tax lawsuits, highway defects, and medical malpractice in state facilities.